Category Archives: Islamophobia

Officials: Major Hasan sought ‘war crimes’ prosecution of U.S. soldiers

Officials: Major Hasan sought ‘war crimes’ prosecution of U.S. soldiers
By Joseph Rhee, Mary-Rose Abraham, Anna Schecter and Brian Ross, ABC News, November 16, 2009

Major Nidal Malik Hasan’s military superiors repeatedly ignored or rebuffed his efforts to open criminal prosecutions of soldiers he claimed had confessed to “war crimes” during psychiatric counseling, according to investigative reports circulated among federal law enforcement officials.

On Nov. 4, the day after his last attempt to raise the issue, he took extra target practice at Stan’s shooting range in nearby Florence, Texas and then closed a safe deposit box he had at a Bank of America branch in Killeen, according to the reports. A bank employee told investigators Hasan appeared nervous and said, “You’ll never see me again.”

Diane Wagner, Bank of America’s senior vice president of media relations, said that her company does not “comment or discuss customer relationships” but is “cooperating fully with law enforcement officials.”

Investigators believe Hasan’s frustration over the failure of the Army to pursue what he regarded as criminal acts by U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan may have helped to trigger the shootings. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — At this point, were it not for one fact, the verdict in the court of public opinion would already be in: Hasan snapped. Had he been a non-Muslim psychiatrist and expressed the same concerns, the assumption that would now widely be made would be that under the stress of feeling like his concerns were being ignored, he became unhinged. But instead, the single most important fact in this case remains in many people’s minds, the fact that Hasan was a Muslim.

Camp Lejeune whistle-blower fired
By Mark Benjamin, Salon, November 15, 2009

Last April, two Marines at Camp Lejeune predicted to a psychiatrist that some Marine back from war was going to “lose it.” Concerned, the psychiatrist asked what that meant. One of the Marines responded, “One of these guys is liable to come back with a loaded weapon and open fire.”

They weren’t talking about Marines suffering from a tangle of mental and religious angst, like news reports suggest haunted the alleged Fort Hood shooter, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan. The risk they reported at Camp Lejeune was broader and systemic. Upon returning home, troops suffering mental health problems were getting dumped into an overwhelmed healthcare system that responded ineptly to their crises, the men reported, and they also faced harassment from Marine Corps superiors ignorant of the severity of their problems and disdainful of those who sought psychiatric help.

As Dr. Kernan Manion investigated the two Marines’ claims about conditions at the North Carolina military base, the largest Marine base on the East Coast, he found they were true. Manion, a psychiatrist hired last January to treat Marines coming home from war with acute mental problems, warned his superiors of looming trouble at Camp Lejeune in a series of increasingly urgent memos.

But instead of being praised for preventing what might have been another Fort Hood massacre, Manion was fired by the contractor that hired him, NiteLines Kuhana LLC. A spokeswoman for the firm says it let Manion go at the Navy’s behest. The Navy declined to comment on this story. [continued…]

Those ‘prone to violence’

Those ‘prone to violence’
By Paul Woodward, War in Context, November 13, 2009

I sometimes wonder: was Charles Krauthammer always such an unhappy man? So often the sourness imprinted upon his face makes it difficult to know whether any distinction can be made between what he thinks and how apparently he feels.

Today he ever-so-predictably joins the ranks of those who declare that the media’s coverage of the Fort Hood massacre has been hamstrung by political correctness. No one in the liberal mainstream dare tell the real story and this vexes Krauthammer almost to the point of rage:

Have we totally lost our moral bearings? Nidal Hasan (allegedly) cold-bloodedly killed 13 innocent people. His business card had his name, his profession, his medical degrees and his occupational identity. U.S. Army? No. “SoA” — Soldier of Allah. In such cases, political correctness is not just an abomination. It’s a danger, clear and present.

Hmmm… So the United States faces a double and dire threat — from Islamic violent extremism and political correctness.

Perhaps political correctness reveals a suicidal tendency within our own culture?

OK, Krauthammer didn’t go quite that far, but I would hardly be surprised if he secretly thinks as much.

But wait a minute, Mr Former Psychiatrist. Aren’t you overlooking an important piece of evidence here?

The latest “proof” that Hasan was a terrorist — as Krauthammer underlines — is that he essentially identified himself as such on his business cards. This is reminiscent of the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed when CIA agents found in his wallet, similar business cards bearing his job title: Head of Strategic Planning, Al Qaeda.

Well, maybe not. Whatever evidence gets presented in Mohammed’s upcoming trial in New York, I’m pretty sure will not include self-incriminating business cards. Indeed, when a “terrorist” prints a business card declaring that he is a Soldier of Allah, this may well suggest — as no doubt Hasan’s defense attorneys will be arguing, if he survives to face trial — that the person bearing such a card was deranged, however diabolical his intentions or actions might have been.

At this point, enough studies have been conducted to determine that mental illness is not a significant driving force behind terrorism. That is not to say that the ranks of al Qaeda are free of the deranged. Abu Zubaydah would be the most well-known case in point. As the FBI’s leading al Qaeda expert said, “This guy is insane, certifiable, split personality.”

Zubaydah’s mental health was regarded, however, as evidence that the organization would not have trusted him with any significant responsibility. From al Qaeda’s perspective, an operative’s susceptibility to becoming unhinged is a liability not an asset.

Neo-McCarthyist Islamophobia Krauthammer on the other hand — a trained expert in the workings of the human mind — displays little interest in whether Hasan might have been delusional. Why? His concern is with a much larger issue, that being: the threat posed to America by those who are “prone to violence.”

In his own nod to political correctness, the Washington Post columnist avoids spelling it out in black and white who he is referring to, yet his allusion is all too transparent: those who are prone to violence are Muslims.

Why have any interest in the possibly twisted mind of a US Army major if you believe that the well from which his violent thoughts were drawn was fed by a poisoned stream: the faith to which he subscribed?

Dr Krauthammer is astute enough to know that he would jeopardize his mainstream status if his warnings were peppered with phrases like “the threat from Islam” or “the Muslim problem”, yet it’s hard not wonder what his prescription might be for dealing with the problem he carefully avoids naming.

To bar Muslims from military service? To institute a military vetting program whose purpose is to root out suspicious Muslims?

Maybe he wants to cast the net much wider.

Maybe it’s time to translate the neo-McCarthyist spirit that Krauthammer represents into a formal process through which the American government can fearlessly challenge its greatest enemy.

“Are you or have you ever been a member of the Islamic faith, had friendships or relationships with Muslims or in any way expressed sympathy or offered support for Muslim activities?” a helpful senator — Joe Lieberman perhaps — might soon be asking.

Muslim US Army psychiatrist displayed suspicious interest in how Muslim soldiers might think and feel

Fort Hood suspect warned of threats within the ranks
By Dana Priest, Washington Post, November 10, 2009

The Army psychiatrist believed to have killed 13 people at Fort Hood warned a roomful of senior Army physicians a year and a half ago that to avoid “adverse events,” the military should allow Muslim soldiers to be released as conscientious objectors instead of fighting in wars against other Muslims.

As a senior-year psychiatric resident at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Maj. Nidal M. Hasan was supposed to make a presentation on a medical topic of his choosing as a culminating exercise of the residency program.

Instead, in late June 2007, he stood before his supervisors and about 25 other mental health staff members and lectured on Islam, suicide bombers and threats the military could encounter from Muslims conflicted about fighting in the Muslim countries of Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a copy of the presentation obtained by The Washington Post.

“It’s getting harder and harder for Muslims in the service to morally justify being in a military that seems constantly engaged against fellow Muslims,” he said in the presentation.

“It was really strange,” said one staff member who attended the presentation and spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the investigation of Hasan. “The senior doctors looked really upset” at the end. These medical presentations occurred each Wednesday afternoon, and other students had lectured on new medications and treatment of specific mental illnesses. [continued…]

Editor’s Comment — Repeat after me: “the struggle against Islam is the central feature of American foreign policy,” said David Brooks as he swung a pendulum before Dana Priest’s sleepy eyes, mesmerizing and helping her settle into the appropriate mindset before she sat down to write this report.

I jest, but truly this is a despicable piece of “reporting”.

Hasan was supposed to make a presentation on a medical topic of his choosing but instead he lectured on Islam, suicide bombers and threats the military could encounter from Muslims conflicted about fighting in the Muslim countries of Iraq and Afghanistan.

What kind of audacity and burgeoning violent extremism would lead an American Muslim training as a military psychiatrist to talk about the moral and spiritual anguish that other American Muslim soldiers might face in wars where they would likely end up killing fellow Muslims or destroying their homes?

Surely the only concern of such a doctor must be that he be well-versed in the diagnostic criteria laid out in the DSM-IV — the bible of modern psychiatry — and that he knows how to prescribe drugs appropriately.

A young confused Muslim American soldier comes in for counseling, troubled about the prospect or reality of killing fellow Muslims.

What’s a well-trained psychiatrist going to say?

“Look son, you’re in an all-volunteer army. Next please.”

Fears of anti-Muslim backlash after Fort Hood massacre

Fears of anti-Muslim backlash after Fort Hood massacre
By Paul Woodward, The National, November 8, 2009

The shooting rampage by a US army psychiatrist, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, at Fort Hood in Texas, came almost six months after the Camp Liberty killings in Iraq where an American army sergeant killed five fellow soldiers at a combat stress centre.

Maj Hasan, one of only 408 psychiatrists serving 553,000 active-duty US troops around the world, was likely to have worked in such a centre when sent to Iraq or Afghanistan. Among the 13 killed on Thursday at the Fort Hood Readiness Centre, a soldier’s last stop before deployment, five were fellow therapists, the army said. [continued…]

Little evidence of terror plot in base killings
By David Johnston and Eric Schmitt, New York Times, November 8, 2009

After two days of inquiry into the mass shooting at Fort Hood, investigators have tentatively concluded that it was not part of a terrorist plot.

Rather, they have come to believe that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused in the shootings, acted out under a welter of emotional, ideological and religious pressures, according to interviews with federal officials who have been briefed on the inquiry.

Investigators have not ruled out the possibility that Major Hasan believed he was carrying out an extremist’s suicide mission. [continued…]

Muslims in U.S. feel unfairly implicated in the war on terror

Muslims in U.S. feel unfairly implicated in the war on terror
By Leila Fadel, McClatchy, October 11, 2009

As the FBI pursues one alleged terrorist plot after another, Muslim Americans are grappling with a widespread sense that the government thinks they all could be terrorists.

In dozens of interviews across the country, McClatchy has found that the government’s search for the enemy within is threatening to divide and destroy America’s Muslim communities.

“It’s not a guilty complex; it’s the stigma of being a Muslim and constantly having to defend religion,” said Edina Lekovic, the communications director for the Muslim Public Affairs Council. “It causes people to give up and say, ‘Why should I bother? No one likes me. Why should I keep trying?’ ”

Americans of all faiths support the government’s efforts to keep them safe, but the war on terrorism looks different to those who find themselves under constant scrutiny because of their religion, ethnicity or both. [continued…]

CAMPAIGN 08 & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Rising above the politics of fear

Muslim voters detect a snub from Obama
By Andrea Elliot, New York Times, June 24, 2008

As Senator Barack Obama courted voters in Iowa last December, Representative Keith Ellison, the country’s first Muslim congressman, stepped forward eagerly to help.

Mr. Ellison believed that Mr. Obama’s message of unity resonated deeply with American Muslims. He volunteered to speak on Mr. Obama’s behalf at a mosque in Cedar Rapids, one of the nation’s oldest Muslim enclaves. But before the rally could take place, aides to Mr. Obama asked Mr. Ellison to cancel the trip because it might stir controversy. Another aide appeared at Mr. Ellison’s Washington office to explain.

“I will never forget the quote,” Mr. Ellison said, leaning forward in his chair as he recalled the aide’s words. “He said, ‘We have a very tightly wrapped message.’ ” [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — I’ve never been a fan of the word “hope” as a campaign slogan. Hope’s easy to come by — most people are able to carry at least a morsel of it all the way to their deathbed. A resource that’s in much shorter supply, yet the one that is really the only antidote to fear — especially when for so many years fear has become the political air that we’ve been compelled to breathe — is courage.

Political courage requires a certain amount of recklessness. It means reaching beyond the dictates of political tactics. If Obama really wants to end the mindset that led us to war, he needs to challenge an element that’s right at the heart of that mindset: America’s fear of Islam. So far, all he’s done is bow down to that fear.

CAMPAIGN 08 & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Don’t fall for the Islamophobic bait

McCain’s pastor problem: the video
By David Corn, Mother Jones, May 8, 2008

During a 2005 sermon, a fundamentalist pastor whom Senator John McCain has praised and campaigned with called Islam “the greatest religious enemy of our civilization and the world,” claiming that the historic mission of America is to see “this false religion destroyed.” In this taped sermon, currently sold by his megachurch, the Reverend Rod Parsley reiterates and amplifies harsh and derogatory comments about Islam he made in his book, Silent No More, published the same year he delivered these remarks. Meanwhile, McCain has stuck to his stance of not criticizing Parsley, an important political ally in a crucial swing state.

In March 2008—two weeks after McCain appeared with Parsley at a Cincinnati campaign rally, hailing him as “one of the truly great leaders in America, a moral compass, a spiritual guide”—Mother Jones reported that Parsley had urged Christians to wage a “war” to eradicate Islam in his 2005 book. McCain’s campaign refused to respond to questions about Parsley, and the presumptive Republican presidential nominee declined to denounce Parsley’s anti-Islam remarks or renounce his endorsement. At a time when Barack Obama was mired in a searing controversy involving Reverend Jeremiah Wright, McCain escaped any trouble for his political alliance with Parsley, who leads the World Harvest Church, a supersized Pentecostal institution in Columbus, Ohio. Parsley, whose sermons are broadcast around the world, has been credited with helping George W. Bush win Ohio in 2004 by registering social conservatives and encouraging them to vote. McCain certainly would like to see Parsley do the same for him—which could explain his reluctance to do any harm to his relationship with this anti-Islam extremist. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — Robert Greenwald’s new video (above) is clearly crafted as a “gotcha” that’s meant to nail the Republicans in response for their exploitation of the Wright videos.

At face value, it’s perfectly legitimate. Rod Parsley is a vociferous Islamophobic hatemonger and McCain should have nothing to do with him. But given that McCain’s association is not particularly personal, is recent and is explicitly political, it’s worth pausing to consider what McCain’s calculations are here and whether he’s taken on the kind of liability of some of us might imagine.

In a Pew poll conducted just over a year ago, Americans ranked “Muslim” as a trait that would make 66% of Republicans less likely to vote for a presidential candidate. Overall, 46% of those polled said they would be less likely to vote for a Muslim candidate and 49% said it would make no difference.

Given that there have been no Muslim candidates in this election, the fact that the question was even being polled is a reflection of the effectiveness of the propaganda campaign that has been waged by Daniel Pipes and others in promoting what has become a widely held belief: that Barak Obama is or was a Muslim.

Were it not for the fact that hostility towards Muslims is widespread in America, and the fact that negative views of Islam and of the Middle East constitute a broadly accepted form of bigotry in this country, Obama could not be “accused” of being a Muslim. Most of those who have defended Obama against this false accusation have chosen to focus almost exclusively on the fact that it’s false while passing over the fact that it could be used as an accusation.

Those who think that McCain’s association with Rod Parsley (or Pastor Hagee) is something for which he might pay a political penalty, seem to be underestimating how deeply Islamophobia has permeated American culture. Yet what’s particularly noteworthy about this prejudice and the way it colors perceptions of all things Middle Eastern is that in a culture where political correctness has had the dubious success of curtailing so many other overt expressions of bigotry, what Parsley and Hagee have to say are things that many and perhaps even the majority of Americans do not find shocking. Islamophobia is the anti-Semiticism of this era. It’s a form of hatred that many people feel comfortable with and which few stand up to oppose.

When one considers the kinds of cultural stereotypes that have shaped America’s views of the Middle East and Islam, it’s not hard to understand why the Islamophobes find it easy to connect with a broad constituency. This isn’t something that started with 9/11. That event merely brought into focus attitudes that had long prevailed.

Check out “Planet of the Arabs” (9 minute video) if you haven’t seen it before and see how far back the fear and hostility goes:

By associating himself with this particular brand of hatemonger, McCain has taken a risk, yet it would seem to be a carefully calculated risk. I suspect his calculations are sound.

Those who want to rebuke him have every reason to feel righteous, but the rebukes are likely to provoke a backlash. We will be accused of being anti-Semitic, of being hostile towards Israel, of undermining the Christian values of America, and of giving comfort to the enemy.

What McCain seems to be doing is hanging out bait in the hope of a double catch: right wing evangelicals who feel culturally embattled and those on the left for whom being righteous serves as a substitute for broad political influence.

If McCain’s pastors really do end up becoming central to the general election, they will likely ending up serving the purpose for which they are intended: to turn this into a contest about which candidate is the most stalwart friend of Israel; who is going to stand up to the threat from Islamic extremism; who will be the most trustworthy defender of American values.

Parsley and Hagee are not McCain’s counterpart to the Wright issue. They are there to help him frame this campaign exactly the way he wants. The media will willingly play its part, and if we are so unwitting, so will we!

OPINION & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Holy shit!

Christian rage and Muslim moderation
By Christopher Dickey, Newsweek, March 27, 2008

Bishop Paul Hinder, the Vatican’s representative in Arabia, was reluctant to criticize the pope, of course, but when I reached him in Abu Dhabi Wednesday morning he clearly had reservations about the way Allam was received into the Church. He said that local Christians took him aside at Easter services and asked him “why it had to be done in such an extraordinary way on a special night.” Hinder contrasted Allam’s conversion to Catholicism with former British prime minister Tony Blair’s, which “was done in a private chapel.”

“What I cannot accept is if it is done in a triumphalistic way,” said Hinder. That is, if Allam were not declaring only his personal beliefs but intentionally demeaning the faith of Muslims. Yet it is hard to read the spectacle of his conversion otherwise, because that’s exactly the tone in which Allam writes. He has made his career portraying Islam as a religion that terrorizes. Allam says he has lived in hiding and in fear for years because of reaction to his columns in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Serra, which regularly denounce excesses by Muslims and praise Israel. Allam converted to Catholicism, he says, as he turned away from “a past in which I imagined that there could be a moderate Islam.” Speaking as if for the pope, Allam told one interviewer in Italy, “His Holiness has launched an explicit and revolutionary message to a church that, up to now, has been too prudent in converting Muslims.”

Allam claims he is hoping his public embrace of Catholicism will help other converts to speak out in public. But that hardly seems likely. The more probable scenario is that others will feel even more vulnerable, while Allam’s books, like many Muslim-bashing screeds that preceded them, climb the best-seller lists.

Unless — and this really would be news — the Muslim world just turns the page. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — Take away all the trappings of sanctity and there’s no getting away from the perception that the Vatican’s answer to Dick Cheney has a devilish streak. Benedict is a shit-stirrer — you can see it in those devious eyes.

CAMPAIGN 08 & EDITOR’S COMMENTS: False rumors and memories

Obama: I’m not a Muslim! Forward this to everyone you know
By Sarah Lai Stirland, Wired, January 24, 2008

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama launched an online viral counteroffensive Tuesday against persistent e-mail chain letters that lie about his religious and political background. But history suggests that the effort might backfire, according to experts in urban myths and folklore.

“The principle is that a very strong denial makes some people think: ‘Uh huh, we knew it. If he’s taken the trouble to make such a strong denial, there must be some truth to it,'” says Bill Ellis, a professor at Pennsylvania State University who studies contemporary folklore and popular cultural responses to societal events like the 9/11 attacks. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — While Obama’s camp should be mindful of James Carroll‘s important observation (that it is Islamophobia in America that prevents the candidate from simply asking, “And what would be wrong if I were a Muslim?”), they should also keep in mind this question: Is someone who is susceptible to being influenced by the Muslim “slur” really likely to consider voting for Obama in the first place? Some attacks really shouldn’t be dignified with a response.

A Clinton twofer’s high price
By Rosa Brooks, Los Angeles Times, January 24, 2008

On foreign policy in particular, Clinton’s presidency was an era of missed opportunities. In Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti, Rwanda and Kosovo, U.S. policy was marred by hesitation and lack of commitment. Despite impressive rhetoric on the emerging challenges posed by globalization, nuclear proliferation, WMD and the rise of transnational terrorism and nonstate actors, Clinton developed few innovative ways to address these challenges; his approach to conflict and crisis was piecemeal. His early defeat on gays in the military left him so scarred that he steered clear of the military for most of his presidency, passively letting uniformed personnel dictate the terms of too many foreign policy decisions and ignoring hard questions about how to reshape the military to face post-Cold War threats. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — I have a feeling that there’s an element to the Clinton nostalgia that’s buoying Hilary that isn’t really nostalgia at all. It’s a presidency “remembered” that never actually occurred; it’s Bill Clinton as president on 9/11 directing America down a road that surely wouldn’t have been as awful as the one along which we actually travelled.

Anti-Bush campaign planned
By Jim Kuhnhenn, AP, January 24, 2008

A liberal advocacy group plans to spend $8.5 million in a drive to ensure that President Bush’s public approval doesn’t improve as his days in the White House come to an end.

Americans United for Change plans to undertake a yearlong campaign, spending the bulk of the money on advertising, to keep public attention on what the group says are the Bush administration’s failures, including the war in Iraq, the response to Hurricane Katrina and the current mortgage crisis.

In selling the plan to fundraisers, the group has argued that support for President Reagan was at a low of 42 percent in 1987 but climbed to 63 percent before he left office. “All of a sudden he became a rallying cry for conservatives and their ideology,” said Brad Woodhouse, the group’s president. “Progressives are still living with that.” [complete article]

CAMPAIGN 08: An inability to recognize ourselves in one another

Islamofascism’s ill political wind
By James Carroll, Boston Globe, January 21, 2008

In contrast to the way militant zealotries of other religions have been perceived, there is a broad conviction, especially among many conservative American Christians, that the inner logic of Islam and fascism go together. Political candidates appeal to those Christians by defining the ambition of Islamofascists in language that makes prior threats from, say, Hitler or Stalin seem benign. The point is that there is a deep religious prejudice at work, and when politicians adopt its code, they make it worse.

The Democrats gain little by shaping their rhetoric to appeal to the Republicans’ conservative religious base, but a readiness to denigrate Islam shows up on their side, too. In last week’s debate, moderator Brian Williams put to Barack Obama a question about Internet rumors that claim he is a Muslim. The tone of the question suggested that Obama was being accused of something heinous. He replied with a simple affirmation that he is a Christian. He did not then ask, “And what would be wrong if I were a Muslim?” Had he done so, it seems clear, he would have cost himself votes in the present climate. [complete article]

Obama reaches the mountaintop
By John Nichols, The Nation, January 21, 2008

… in his Sunday speech at the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr’s Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Barack Obama went to a higher ground — to that mountaintop that King occupied until his death on April 4, 1968, and that Bobby Kennedy stood for a brief and remarkable political moment that played out between April and June of that fateful year.

“Unity is the great need of the hour – the great need of this hour. Not because it sounds pleasant or because it makes us feel good, but because it’s the only way we can overcome the essential deficit that exists in this country,” Obama told a audience that hung on the every word of the most emotionally-effective orator to seek the presidency since Kennedy.

“I’m not talking about a budget deficit. I’m not talking about a trade deficit. I’m not talking about a deficit of good ideas or new plans,” explained Obama. “I’m talking about a moral deficit. I’m talking about an empathy deficit. I’m taking about an inability to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we are our brother’s keeper; we are our sister’s keeper; that, in the words of Dr. King, we are all tied together in a single garment of destiny.” [complete article]

What does it mean to be the pro-Israel candidate?
By Gershom Gorenberg, The American Prospect, January 18, 2008

The main reason that Democratic candidates are less frightening to a progressive Israeli worrying about his country’s future, as my progressive friends in Washington remind me, is that the Democrats may be jiving. That is, because they are sensible folks otherwise, we can assume they don’t really mean this stuff. They even hide small hints of moderation in their rhetoric. The Republicans’ sincerity is truly scary.

I suggest that it’s time to talk about what “pro-Israel” should mean. Not because the discussion will change campaign rhetoric: The candidates will stick to cliches. But after the election, one will have to govern. Members of Congress will need to decide how to vote on the usual strident resolutions backed by AIPAC. Debate now on what it means to support Israel might mean that a year from now, elected leaders will be able to refer to publicly recognized ideas to justify acting more sensibly. [complete article]

OPINION: Threatening Muslims

Giuliani campaign’s Muslim fallout
By James Ridgeway, The Guardian, December 31, 2007

Traveling around New Hampshire last week, the GuardianFilms team dropped in on a Rudy Giuliani house party. With cameras running we caught one of Giuliani’s New Hampshire state leaders as he derided and even threatened Muslims. The story turned out to have some resonance, winding its way from Guardian Unlimited, through the liberal blogosphere and into the US mainstream media before becoming an embarrassment for the Giuliani campaign.

At Manchester mayor Frank Guinta’s house party John Deady blended in with the mostly white, professional crowd. A retired military intelligence officer and state co-chair of Veterans for Rudy, he has been active in Republican politics for decades. He was eager to share his enthusiasm for Giuliani and what he saw as Rudy’s no-nonsense, get tough approach to America’s legions of enemies around the world, particularly the Muslims.

He has got, I believe, the knowledge and the judgment to attack one of the most difficult problems in current history, and that is the rise of the Muslims. Make no mistake about it; this hasn’t happened for a thousand years. These people are very, very dedicated. They’re also very smart in their own way, and we need to keep the feet to the fire and keep pressing these people until we defeat them or chase them back to their caves, or, in other words, get rid of them.

Deady wasn’t the only one with intense pro-Rudy sentiments at the party. Another supporter told us, “We are going to protect what is ours. If it means we’ve got to shoot you in the head then so be it. I think he’s the guy who can do that.” [complete article]

ANALYSIS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: The Iranian strategic threat – shattered or just fractured?

They stole the threat from us
By Zvi Bar’el, Haaretz, December 10, 2007

Iran is indeed deceptive, but it is not crazy. It operates according to a systematic political and diplomatic rationale. But since 1979 this political rationale has been swallowed up in international rhetoric, mainly American and Israeli, which has portrayed Iran as the ultimate global enemy. This is why the American report is such a great blow to Israel. The report does not dismiss the Iranian threat – though it does not substantiate it – but it snatches an important strategic asset from Israel. No longer can Israel play the regional power that charts the map of global strategic threats; the state that mobilized the world against Iran will now assume the role of nudnik.

But Israel’s real problem is that Iran is also losing its status as a strategic threat because of the report, and Israel will find it difficult to “enlist” Iran to promote its regional policy. For example, what justification will Israel have for demanding that Syria sever its relations with Iran as a condition for conducting negotiations once American intelligence has certified Iran as being somewhat acceptable? What good can come from emphasizing the ties between Iran and Hamas or Hezbollah when Iran is now portrayed as a state that no longer threatens the region? And why should the Annapolis conference be described as designed to stymie Iran?

Israel is not the only one with this problem. Its Arab counterparts, who are stuck in the same anti-Iran pit, are also panicking. When Iran’s nuclear threat is not recognized, two fronts collapse: the Iranian-Shi’ite front, which brought Israel closer to some of the Arab states, and the Israeli front against radical organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas, or against Syria. In each of these fronts, Iran serves as a connecting axis, an enemy against which coalitions of interests were built and agreements between rivals were generated.

Thus, for example, most Arab countries perceive Iran’s involvement in Lebanon as not just an intervention by a foreign state in Arab affairs, but as a penetration by a hostile state. And Israel intensifies Hezbollah’s tactical threat into a strategic threat because of the Iran connection. Hamas is also accorded the status of a super-threat because of Israel’s efforts to link it with Iran, the mother of all threats, so that we almost forget that the Hamas threat is based only on Qassam rockets.

These enemies will revert to being only “local enemies,” not part of an axis of evil (which also collapses because of the American report). They will no longer be emissaries of a nuclear monster. Israel will have to go back to routine, boring enemies whom it can fight using checkpoints and electricity cuts. Back to Annapolis. Back to the grind.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, some people said the U.S. would have to manufacture a new strategic threat. It will be interesting to see what Israel does after the American report shattered its strategic threat. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — The NIE, if viewed as a precision attack aimed at preventing military strikes on Iran in 2008, almost certainly hit its target. But if viewed as a strategic weapon designed to re-shape America and Israel’s approach to the Middle East, it remains to be seen whether an intelligence report alone is capable of bringing about such a sweeping effect.

Consider the difference between American views of Iran and North Korea. It is widely recognized that the North Korean people suffer a depth of oppression from their own government far greater than do the Iranians. The Islamic Republic of Iran, having become distanced from its revolutionary roots, is in many ways the most modern and Westernized of Middle Eastern countries. North Korea on the other hand is for good reason often referred to as the Hermit Kingdom. Iran put its nuclear weapons program on hold while North Korea forged ahead and put its own nuclear weapons to the test. North Korean power is concentrated in the hands of a mercurial leader, while Iranian power is more diffused through a complex power structure.

Why then should the NIE’s most significant “revelation” be the following claim?

Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005. Our assessment that the program probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure suggests Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged previously.

To say that Iran may be more vulnerable to influence than previously judged actually says more about that previous judgment than it says about Iran. And that judgment reveals the critical difference between the views of Iran and those of North Korea.

Iran is the nation state upon which American and Israeli Islamophobia is most sharply focused. Even though there are fewer reasons to regard North Korea as a rational actor, fear of North Korea’s sometimes unpredictable leadership is not matched with an image of some amorphous, demonic Korean threat.

North Korea’s inclusion in the “axis of evil” always looked like a feeble attempt to deflect the charge that the administration was waging a war on Islam. Yet in spite of its inclusion there was no matching and full-blooded demonization. As a result we are now witness to a spectacular turnaround in the Bush administration’s approach to a pariah state, known to be involved in nuclear proliferation. President Bush has just written to “Dear Chairman” Kim Jong Il, and the New York Philarmonic orchestra will soon land in Pyongyang in an effort to serenade the hermit out of its shell.

What hope is there that we might witness such conciliatory gestures aimed at Tehran?

The challenge for Iran is not merely that it nurture a budding understanding in Washington that the United States is actually dealing with a rational actor. The greater challenge lies in the undoing of a pervasive fear that has long been merchandised by people who have no interest in now either owning up to a purposeful deceit or abandoning a deep-seated prejudice.

NEWS, OPINION & EDITOR’S COMMENT: Islamophobia goes unchallenged

Foes use Obama’s Muslim ties to fuel rumors about him
By Perry Bacon Jr., Washington Post, November 29, 2007

In his speeches and often on the Internet, the part of Sen. Barack Obama’s biography that gets the most attention is not his race but his connections to the Muslim world.

Since declaring his candidacy for president in February, Obama, a member of a congregation of the United Church of Christ in Chicago, has had to address assertions that he is a Muslim or that he had received training in Islam in Indonesia, where he lived from ages 6 to 10. While his father was an atheist and his mother did not practice religion, Obama’s stepfather did occasionally attend services at a mosque there.

Despite his denials, rumors and e-mails circulating on the Internet continue to allege that Obama (D-Ill.) is a Muslim, a “Muslim plant” in a conspiracy against America, and that, if elected president, he would take the oath of office using a Koran, rather than a Bible, as did Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), the only Muslim in Congress, when he was sworn in earlier this year. [complete article]

WaPo reporter responds to all the criticism of front-page Obama Muslim piece
TPM, November 29, 2007

Okay, the Washington Post reporter who wrote today’s front page article on the rumors that Obama is a Muslim has now responded to all the criticism of the piece he’s been getting from readers and elsewhere today.

A number of you have written in to us to say that you had emailed the reporter, Perry Bacon, Jr., and that you had received responses from him. So I went to Bacon, and he sent over a shortened version of the statement he’s been sending back to readers:

I thought the facts that 1. these falsehoods persist and 2. Obama make mentions of his time living in a Muslim country on the campaign trail as part of his foreign policy were both worth remarking. I think the story makes clear, including in the candidate’s own words, he is a Christian.

Anyway, that’s Bacon’s response. Enter it into the record forthwith.

Update: In a chat with readers today, WaPo reporter Lois Romano addressed the controversy over the story. She observed that Obama has denied being a Muslim, adding that “airing some of this and giving him a chance to deny its accuracy could be viewed as setting the record straight.”

Right, but the problem here is that WaPo, and not just Obama, should have “denied the accuracy” of the Obama-is-a-Muslim nonsense. The Obama Muslim smear is based on lies, not “rumors.” Bacon in his statement above calls the Obama Muslim smears “falsehoods.” But they aren’t identified as such in the piece. That’s what everyone is yelling about. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — Let’s suppose that the word flying around the rightwing blogosphere was that Obama was Jewish. Would anyone be referring to that as a smear? Obama and others would point out that he’s a Christian, not a Jew, but we would not be hearing about the Obama “Jewish smears.”

In the outrage being expressed about the Obama “Muslim smear”, where is the outrage at the fact that in pluralistic, democratic America the label Muslim can be used as a smear? Apparently it goes without saying that Islamophobia is a socially acceptable current in presidential politics.

If the editor’s of the Washington Post want to salvage their newspaper’s reputation, how about reporting on the parallels between American images of Communists during the McCarthy era and the bipartisan vilification of Islam and Muslims that exists as an unchallenged bigotry in much of America today?

NEWS: The media’s role in promoting Islamophobia

Study shows ‘demonisation’ of Muslims
PA, The Guardian, November 14, 2007

A “torrent” of negative stories has been revealed by a study of the portrayal of Muslims and Islam in the media, according to a report published yesterday.

Research into one week’s news coverage showed that 91% of articles in national newspapers about Muslims were negative. The London mayor, Ken Livingstone, who commissioned the study, said the findings were a “damning indictment” of the media and urged editors and programme makers to review the way they portray Muslims.

“The overall picture presented by the media is that Islam is profoundly different from and a threat to the west,” he said. “There is a scale of imbalance which no fair-minded person would think is right.” Only 4% of the 352 articles studied were positive, he said.

Livingstone said the findings showed a “hostile and scaremongering attitude” towards Islam and likened the coverage to the way the left was attacked by national newspapers in the early 1980s. “The charge is that there are virtually no positive or balanced images of Islam being portrayed,” he said. “I think there is a demonisation of Islam going on which damages community relations and creates alarm among Muslims.” [complete article]

NEWS: LAPD ditches Muslim map plan

LAPD’s Muslim mapping plan killed
By Richard Winton and Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times, November 15, 2007

The LAPD on Wednesday abruptly scrapped a program to map the city’s Muslim population, a major retreat for a department that said the system was needed to identify potential hotbeds of extremism.

The reversal comes after a week of protests from Muslim groups and civil libertarians, who equated the mapping with religious profiling. Others questioned whether it was possible for the LAPD to accurately map the city’s far-flung Muslim community.

Los Angeles Police Department Deputy Chief Michael P. Downing said Wednesday that in the wake of the protests, officials would drop the mapping aspect of the plan but continue their efforts to reach out to the Muslim community. Downing and other police officials plan to outline the new strategy to Muslim American activists at a meeting today. [complete article]

OPINION: Is Islamophobia the ticket to the White House?

Rudy and Pat: hate expectations
By Eboo Patel, Washington Post, November 11, 2007

You have to wonder how the conversation went: Did Rudy begin by convincing Pat that hating Muslims was more important than hating homosexuals? Or did he start by saying that hating Muslims should come before protecting fetuses?

One thing is crystal clear: Rudy knows Republican math. To win Republican primaries, you have to win the hearts of the Religious Right. And Rudy wasn’t going to do that with his life story (multiple marriages, multiple divorces) or his social positions (pro gay rights, pro choice). His only hope was to change the subject. And hating Muslims is a popular topic in Religious Right circles these days.

Here is what Rudy had to say about his new BFF Pat Robertson: “… he has a tremendous amount of insight into what the main issues are and how they should be dealt with.”

The main issue for Rudy is how to exploit the current fear of Muslims into a winning presidential campaign. Pat Robertson will offer his insights on that issue alongside America’s most prominent Islamophobes, including Norman Podhoretz, Peter King and Daniel Pipes. [complete article]

OPINION: U.S. shouldn’t exclude academics critical of its policies

The U.S. blacklisted me. Let’s talk
By Tariq Ramadan, Christian Science Monitor, October 31, 2007

For years, I worked tirelessly in academic and public circles to dismantle the barriers erected by those who see Islam and the West as mutually exclusive, to build bridges of mutual understanding and respect. Since 2001, I have also intensified my work to remind my fellow Western citizens of the fragility of our societies and the precariousness of our civil liberties as we are thrust into this so-called war on terrorism. Since the end of 2004, I have done this primarily in Europe through my academic work, debates, and public lectures and by working closely with European politicians, governmental agencies, and civic institutions. But I have been prevented from doing this work on American soil. [complete article]

OPINION: Engaging Hamas and Hezbollah

Engaging Hamas and Hezbollah
By Ali Abunimah, The Electronic Intifada, October 29, 2007

Nothing could be easier in the present atmosphere than to accuse anyone who calls for recognition of and dialogue with Hamas, Hezbollah and other Islamist movements of being closet supporters of reactionary “extremism” or naive fellow travelers of “terrorists.” This tactic is not surprising coming from neoconservatives and Zionists. What is novel is to see it expressed in supposedly progressive quarters.

Arun Kundnani has written about a “new breed of liberal” whose outlook “regards Muslims as uniquely problematic and in need of forceful integration into what it views as the inherently superior values of the West.” The target of these former leftists, Kundnani argues, “is not so much Islamism as the appeasing attitudes they detect among [other] liberals.”

Such views are now creeping into the Palestinian solidarity movement. MADRE, an “international women’s human rights organization,” presents one example. In the wake of the Hamas election victory and takeover of Gaza from US- and Israeli-backed Fatah warlords, MADRE declared that the challenge for Palestine solidarity activists is “how do we support the people of Palestine without endorsing the Hamas leadership?” Calling for what it terms “strategic solidarity” as opposed to “reflexive solidarity,” MADRE defines Hamas as a “repressive” movement “driven by militarism and nationalism,” which “aims to institutionalize reactionary ideas about gender and sexuality,” while using “religion as a smokescreen to pursue its agenda.” Similarly strident and dismissive claims have been made by a Washington-based pro-Palestinian advocacy group. [complete article]